Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is a prominent grant-making organization co-founded by Bill and Melinda Gates in 2000, headquartered in Seattle, Washington, with additional offices in Washington, D.C.; New Delhi, India; Beijing, China; and London, United Kingdom. The foundation focuses on improving global health, enhancing education, and providing support to at-risk families, particularly in the Pacific Northwest. It actively promotes strategies that assist low-income families and works towards greater equality in various sectors. The foundation is also involved in investment management, overseeing an endowment that includes a diverse portfolio primarily in public equity and fixed income markets, while excluding tobacco-related investments. Its trustees include Bill Gates, Melinda Gates, and Warren Buffett.

Carolyn Ainslie

Chief Financial Officer

Brandi Bogosian

Deputy Director, Investment Reporting

Jennifer Deger

Director of Finance and Controller

Sue Desmond-Hellmann

Chief Executive Officer

Past deals in Seattle, WA

UW Medicine

Grant in 2023
UW Medicine Health System is headquartered in the United States. UW Medicine Health System operates as a subsidiary of University of Washington.

Phase Genomics

Grant in 2022
Phase Genomics, Inc. is a biotechnology company founded in 2015 and located in Seattle, Washington. The company specializes in advanced genomic technologies, particularly ProxiMeta Hi-C genome assembly and metagenome deconvolution. Its mission is to assist scientists in making significant discoveries by delivering highly complete and accurate genomes and metagenomes. Through its innovative approaches, Phase Genomics aims to enhance the understanding of complex biological systems, facilitating research in various fields of life sciences.

Icosavax

Grant in 2020
Icosavax is focused on developing safe and effective vaccines against infectious diseases that address important unmet medical needs and reduce healthcare costs. tHEY were founded on breakthrough computationally-designed virus-like particle technology, exclusively licensed for a variety of infectious disease indications from the Institute for Protein Design at the University of Washington.

A-Alpha Bio

Grant in 2020
A-Alpha Bio, Inc., founded in 2017 and based in Seattle, Washington, specializes in synthetic biology with a focus on drug development that targets multiple proteins. The company's flagship platform, AlphaSeq, offers innovative cell-based tools for quantitative and high-throughput measurement of protein interactions. This technology accelerates processes such as target discovery, library screening, and preclinical drug characterization, addressing significant bottlenecks in the industry. By providing biologics and molecular glue discovery and optimization services, A-Alpha Bio supports pharmaceutical companies in enhancing binding and specificity for various target proteins. The team comprises experts in synthetic biology, structural biology, and next-generation sequencing, all dedicated to advancing drug discovery methodologies.

Phase Genomics

Grant in 2019
Phase Genomics, Inc. is a biotechnology company founded in 2015 and located in Seattle, Washington. The company specializes in advanced genomic technologies, particularly ProxiMeta Hi-C genome assembly and metagenome deconvolution. Its mission is to assist scientists in making significant discoveries by delivering highly complete and accurate genomes and metagenomes. Through its innovative approaches, Phase Genomics aims to enhance the understanding of complex biological systems, facilitating research in various fields of life sciences.

Code.org

Grant in 2017
Code.org is a non-profit organization focused on expanding computer programming education in the United States. It aims to integrate computer science into the core curriculum of K-12 education, alongside other STEM subjects. The foundation offers free online courses that utilize open source technology, allowing for widespread access to high-quality educational resources. Its curriculum materials and tutorials are shared under a Creative Commons license, promoting non-commercial use and collaboration. By fostering a greater understanding of computer science, Code.org seeks to prepare students for the demands of a technology-driven world.

Just - Evotec Biologics

Series A in 2016
Just Evotec Biologics was founded in 2014 and acquired by Evotec in 2019. The company has an intense focus on the design of innovative and integrated technologies to accelerate the development of biotherapeutics and reduce their manufacturing cost. Core strengths include antibody discovery, molecular design, process and product design and manufacturing plant design.
IDRI is a Seattle-based not-for-profit committed to applying innovative science to the research and development of products to prevent, detect and treat infectious diseases of poverty. By integrating capabilities, we strive to create an efficient pathway to bring scientific innovation from the lab to the people who need it most.

Startup Weekend

Grant in 2011
Startup Weekend is an entrepreneurship foundation and an educational movement for entrepreneurs. It helps entrepreneurs obtain related education, launch businesses, build networks, learn skills, join global communities, save money, and more. Launched in January 2007, Startup Weekend provides an entrepreneurial business workshop within a 54-hour weekend, bringing business ideas to the stage of incorporation of an organization with its solutions.